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THE STATE 



HIGHER EDUCATION, 



AN ADDRESS 



BEFORE THE 



Minnesota Academy of Natural Sciences. 



PROF. N. H WINCHELL. 

[Jan. 12th, 1881,] 
[Extracted from Bulletin 3, Vol. II, of the Academy of Sciences.] 



MINNEAPOLIS : 

HENNIG & KRUCKEBERG, PRINTERS. 
1881. 



u 






THE STATE AND HIGHER EDUCATION. 



An Address delivered Jan. 12, 1881, before the Minnesota Academy of Natural Science,? 



BY PROF. N. H. WINCHELL. 



Ladies and Gentlemen, Members of the Minnesota Academy of 

Natural Sciences: 

(i.) If a stranger were to enter your house and declare 
with deliberate words that the dwelling which you had built 
-and had occupied for a period of years with your family, 
where also you expected to see your children grow up, and to 
spend your declining years, was not yours by right nor by 
title, and should set forth the claims he had to enter and pos- 
sess the premises, you certainly would be startled at the 
announcement. In exactly that position is placed the State 
of Minnesota to-day, in reference to the educational structure 
which she has erected. I refer not here to brick and mortar,, 
but to something more enduring, and more vital to the State. 
She has been served with a process to show cause why, and 
how, she came into possession of the educational system she 
now has, and why she should not be compelled to surrender 
it to another, or to exchange it for one that is set up as better. 

You may judge of the surprise of a few of us who heard 
the late inaugural address of President John, of Hamline uni- 



2 TJic State and HigJicr Education. 

versity, when informed that "higher education should not be 
under the control of the State;" that facilities for higher edu- 
cation "existed in this country and met all demands before 
State colleges were thought of;" and that these State colleges 
"are the outgrowth, not of necessity, but of an act of con- 
gress, the design of which is a conspicuous and universally 
acknowledged failure." In the place of these, and the right 
of the State to conduct them, are offered the colleges of the 
church, and the right of the church to conduct all education. 

It sometimes becomes necessary to reinvestigate vital fund- 
amental principles. This is an old question; one that during 
the last thirty or forty years has been brought frequently 
before educational and scientific audiences; and although the 
right of the State to educate has been acknowledged in nearly 
all parts of the Union, and the State institutions have been 
triumphant over all obstacles, it is again necessary to review 
and reassert the ground on which they stand. 

(2.) Let us inquire then how it all came about, that the 
State finds itself in the conduct of systematic education. 

In the dawn of modern knowledge,' when the human mind 
was beginning to cast about for release from the burdens and 
bondage of the dark and middle ages, the pilgrim fathers 
landed on the "bleak New England shore." Co-ordinate 
with their love of religious freedom was their love of educa- 
tion; and sixteen years after the landing Harvard college was 
founded; though at first only a public school, at which many 
Indian children were taught. The right of every human 
mind to think, and to be responsible for its own acts, which 
lay at the bottom of the reformation in the sixteenth century, 
carried with it, in the theory as well as the practice of the 
pilgrim fathers, the necessity of becoming well informed; and 
hence the duty to extend the sphere of education to its 
utmost limit. From this initial point the idea that the whole 
people shall be educated, at least in the branches needed by 
the average citizen, has been extended in one form and 



The State and Higher Education. 3 

another, throughout all of the States of the Union. 
Although at first the Massachusetts colony passed a law that 
every township containing fifty householders should support 
a teacher to teach their children to read and write, and every 
township containing lOO householders should maintain a 
grammar school capable of fitting youth for the university, 
yet this complete course of articulated grades has not been 
maintained. From one reason and another, the stipulated 
amount of instruction offered by the State has been reduced 
from this high standard set by early Massachusetts, so that in 
most of the States, as well as in Massachusetts, the law now 
specifies such branches as orthography, reading, writing, 
English grammar, geography, arithmetic, and the history of 
the United States, allowing the local committees to extend the 
list of branches so as to include general history, book-keep- 
ing, surveying, geometry, natural philosophy, Latin and the 
various sciences. This permitted extension has resulted in 
the creation, under constant reg^ulation of State law, of what 
are known throughout the western and northern States as 
union schools and as high schools. Thus the people, who in 
America constitute the State, have assumed to educate them- 
selves, at least through the grades of the primary and second- 
ary schools. In many of the States the early zeal for educa- 
tion has been retained, and even extended, resulting not only 
in offering the means of learning, but in requiring the child 
to avail himself of it, as a vital necessity for the perpetuatiou 
of an enlightened commonwealth, specifying the extent to 
which every parent must see that his child attends the public 
schools, or others acceptable. It may be said, however, that 
primary and secondary education by the State is not opposed 
by the church. It happens not to be generally by the Prot- 
estant church, but the Roman church is strongly opposed to 
it, and seems to be determined to substitute for it some more 
strictly religious instruction. 

On the other hand, if we consider the origin of higher edu- 



4 The State and Higher Education. 

cation by the State, we must seek for its beginning on the 
otlier side of the Atlantic. While the idea of the primary 
and secondary education of the whole people through the 
agency of the State was earliest developed in America, and 
has only in late years been adopted by European govern- 
ments, the founding and maintenance of institutions for higher 
education by the State was agitated and accomplished first in 
Europe. 

The liberation of the human intellect from the thralldom of 
the mediaeval church gave rise to multitudinous speculation, 
and to many attempts in various directions to ameliorate the 
hard condition of the masses of the people. These philo- 
sophical speculations, which are too often indulged in even in 
our days, fell under the ban of the church at once. It was a 
long time before the true idea of science, the study of the 
actual, was fully recognized. But when it finally did appear, 
it was the legitimate outgrowth of that freedom of thought 
and stimulated observation which came with the Reformation. 
One of the first natural fruits, therefore, of the revival was 
the development of science, and the information of the people 
concerning common and actual affairs. There arose imme- 
diately a demand for schools that could teach technical and 
industrial science. There were no primary or secondary 
schools; and the universities, established for perpetuating and 
instructing the priesthood, were much averse to admitting 
any innovations upon their established methods of scholastic 
drill. The idea of education, except as a means of indoctrin- 
ation, was received with no favor. In the midst of this fog 
of prejudice, which enveloped and darkened all Europe, a few 
bolder men agitated the needfulness of those branches of 
learning that bear upon the industries of the whole people. 
Edward Somerset, second marquis of Worcester, was of 
these one of the first, and the most notable. Some of the 
earliest ideas of many modern inventions, including that of 
the steam engine, were conceived and published by him In 



The State aiid Higher Education. 5 

the middle of the seventeenth century. He urged that young 
men should receive instruction relating to the various national 
ndustries. But he is said to have died in poverty, persecuted 
and maligned. "With Strafford and Laud on one side, and 
Hampden and Cromwell on the other, there was but poor 
hearing for the industrial ideas of the marquis of Worcester. " 
And "for two centuries afterward Oxford and Cambridge 
ground out the old scholastic product in the old scholastic 
way;" and after them were fashioned the higher institutions 
of learning in America. 

In 1828 the university of London wasi opened. It was the 
result of an agitation by the best scholars and thinkers of 
England including Macaulay, in favor of an institution adap- 
ted to the needs of the people. By this time the sciences had 
made considerable progress in utilizing their discoveries for the 
comfort and civilization of the people, but the universities of 
Oxford and Cambridge had not changed their curricula. This 
new university, although at first based on popular subscriptions 
and donations, was reorganized and enlarged eleven years af- 
terward, and adopted by Parliament, with a stated appropria- 
tion of money for its support. In England this was the first 
governmental recognition of the "new education." It was the 
result of a pressure of public sentiment, heard loudest in the 
House of Commons, that the government could not safely 
withstand, although in England the State was combined with 
the established church to prolong the domination of the old 
scholastic methods. This new institution has constantly 
encountered the sneers of the church and state men, and to 
this day its graduates are hardly admitted to equal rank and 
favor by the older universities. 

In Ireland, a little later, a somewhat similar demand, long 
resisted by Protestant Trinity and Roman Catholic Maynooth, 
was made for the recognition of the needs of the industrial 
classes. This demand wasurged by the Dissenters also. It 
was answered on a more extensive and systematic scale. The 



6 TJie State and Higher Ediieatiort. 

void was filled by the establishment of the Queen's university 
and colleges, in the year 1856. The characteristic features of 
this system are: 

First — The recognition of Christian principles, but the dis- 
allowance of any sectarian tests. 

Second — A full scholastic training, as in the older univers- 
ities, based on the ancient languages and pure mathematics. 

Third — A regular and very full course in natural science. 

Fourth — A thorough drill in the modern languages, partic- 
ularly the English. 

Here then we see in England and Ireland, in the face of 
the opposition of both Protestant and Roman churches, a 
great uprising of the better informed communities of the 
nineteenth century, which results in the creation of a com- 
plete scheme of higher institutions of learning by the order 
and agency of the State itself, wholly separated from church 
control. 

Still later was established the government Department of 
Science and, Art, organized to. embrace' (i) the royal schCol of 
mines, (2) the royal college of chemistry, (3) the museum of 
science and art of Edinburg, and (4) the South Kensington 
museum of art, with 525 elementary schools of science. 

On the continent, as in England, the first universities were 
the creatures and agents of the church, though often bearing 
royal charters. In France, by the revolution, they were all 
swept away, and a new system of educational machinery, 
from the primary to the higher, was put into operation under 
the imperial government. While in all of the schools relig- 
ious instruction is given in accordance with the prevailing 
worship of the commune, yet none of the schools are under 
the direction of the church. Under this system it was very 
easy, in 1865, to inaugurate, by a new law, a course of study 
in the secondary schools, intended to convey the elements of 
science and its applications, or to "found," as the law states, 
"the sub-officers of industry." 



The State and Higher Edueation. 7 

In Germany the universities have been among the foremost 
in developing modern science and in disseminating that 
knowledge which has been in request by the intellectual and 
scientific awakening of the eighteenth and nineteenth cen- 
turies. The church here is allowed to give religious instruc 
tion in the schools, and the Jews, Catholics and Lutherans 
are placed on the same footing. Every step of the pupil, 
from the primary grade to the university, is under the inspec- 
tion of the State, and all the regulations and appointments 
are made by the State. Under this system the universities 
have rapidly accepted the progressive ideas of modern indus- 
trial and technical education, and the Crown has instituted in 
the secondary grade the "real schools", in order to fit the uni- 
versity applicant with the necessary introduction to science, 
to enable him to advance to the higher stages in the scientific 
instruction of the university. 

Holland has had a law for State education since 1806, cov- 
ering the whole scale, from the primary school to the univer- 
sity. But the schools are wholly undenominational. "Relig- 
ious instruction is left to the different religious communions," 
while the schools are required to inculcate all Christian and 
social virtues. 

In Switzerland the system of State education, while "based 
on the principles of Christianity and democracy" is compul- 
sory from the seventh to the fifteenth year, and in some of the 
Cantons was purposely so organized as to strengthen the demo- 
cratic as against the clerical party. Here the doctrines of the 
reformation, as expounded by William Farel and subsequently 
confirmed and established by Calvin, have taken firm hold of 
the whole polity of the nation. Calvin awakened a taste for 
the exact sciences at Geneva, and the university became a 
place of resort for education by the Protestant youth of Great 
Britain, France and Germany. At the present time one of 
the four faculties of the university of Geneva is that of sci- 
ence. More lately the "Polytechnicon" have been established 



8 TJie State and Higher Education. 

at Zurich, covering those manufacturing industries which, a 
few years ago, had so far outstripped the English engineering 
and mechanics as to incite an English commission to investi- 
gate the cause of the inferiority of home manufactures. 

Thus we find that none of the old universities, except when 
under the control of the government, and sometimes not even 
then, have been willing to modify their curricula in compli- 
ance with the demands and spirit of the age. If they have 
done it, as more lately at Oxford university, it is only after 
the force of public sentiment has been able to batter down 
the walls of prejudice and conceit with which they have been 
surrounded. During this whole conflict throughout Europe 
the church, in its various forms, but particularly the Roman 
church, instead of being the champion and refuge of free 
thought and free knowledge, has been the most powerful 
obstacle to its progress, and has persistently opposed every 
movement to introduce the means for disseminating useful 
knowledge among the people. The heat of the conflict is 
passed. The tide has set in the right direction. The old 
universities perceive the triumph of modern science. Euro- 
pean governments are unanimously striving for the establish- 
ment of modern schools of science on the broadest founda- 
tions, and equipping them with the fullest appliances. 

Now let us turn to America, and inquire how this history 
has been mirrrored on our institutions of higher learning. 

In the first place the church colleges that arose in this coun- 
try prior to 1824, or even later, were modeled after the medi- 
eval universities of Oxford and Cambridge, so far as they 
expanded into the dimensions of a university. For the most 
part they were simply colleges of classical lore, with but one 
course of study, aiming specifically, at first, to educate young 
men for the clerical profession. As they were born of the 
English universities, so they inherited their medieval narrow- 
ness and bigotry. As the early church had grappled with 
Copernicus and Galileo, and had been worsted, so the later 



^ The State a?id Higher Ediicatioji. 9 

church would grapple with everything that bore a resemb- 
lance to or intimation of any new fangled notions of nature. 
Although the world had made wonderful strides in human 
knowledge, the colleges shut their eyes and ears to the change. 
The age demanded education in the great industries that char- 
acterize modern society, but could get only that of the age of 
Elizabeth. As modern science and civilization began to buzz 
about their doors, they drew themselves within their shells, 
affrighted, like snails. Having none of the elements of the 
new light within them, they were literally enslaved to them- 
selves and could not escape. They began to sink in public 
esteem. Their graduates failed conspicuously in competition 
in all the affairs of life with self-made men. Finally, in view 
of this disparity between the demand and supply of industrial 
and scientific instruction in America, a far-seeing and gener- 
ous business man, Stephan Van Renssellaer by name, came 
forward with private means, and became the first to endow, 
in America, a "school of theoretical and applied science." 
This was done in 1824, and it is located at Troy, New York. 
Twenty years later the first voluntary effort was made within 
one of the old church colleges of America to regulate the 
curriculum so as to conform to the new demands, and al- 
though pushed by one of the ablest educators of America, 
Francis Wayland, in his own institution, and with his own 
denomination, at Brown university, the movement ended in 
a conspicuous defeat of the "new education." After the suc- 
cessful establishment of the Troy Polytechnic Institute, the 
example of Van Renssellaer was followed in Connecticut by 
Joseph E. Sheffield in the founding of the Sheffield Scientific 
school, which became attached to, but by no means recognized 
as co-ordinate with, the old line course in Yale college. 
This was in i860. In 1847, soon after the failure of Dr. 
Wayland at Brown University, Abbot Lawrence endowed the 
Lawrence Scientific school at Harvard college. 

About this time the leg-islature of the new States of the 



lO The State and Higher Edtication. 

West began to express the sentiments of the people. In Ill- 
inois conventions met in 1 85 1 to consider such means as 
might be deemed expedient to further the interests of an ag- 
ricultural community, and to take steps toward the estab- 
lishment of an agricultural college. They met not as Pres- 
byterians, or Methodists, or Romanists, but as an agricul- 
tural community. The next year petitions were sent to con- 
gress for the endowment of industrial universities in each 
State. In 1850 the agricultural college of Michigan was pro- 
vided for by the State constitution, and it went into opera- 
tioh in 1855. The scientific course of the university of Mich- 
igan was ordered by the State legislature in 185 i. In 1858 
Iowa appropriated money for a model farm and an agricul- 
tural college. In Kentucky, under the guide of Regent 
Bowman an institution, chartered in 1858, had been estab- 
lished for "diffusing education among the industrial classes." 
In Pennsylvania an agricultural college was established in 
1854, and in Maryland in 1856. In New York, as early as 
1837, a project for establishing an agricultural college at Al- 
bany, was entered upon and a site was selected. This resul- 
ted in failure. It was revived in 1844, and again failed 
through the death of a liberal friend of the enterprise; but in 
1856 the State Agricultural society of New York induced the 
legislature to appropriate $40,000 for a college of agricul- 
ture. This institution was established at Ovid, and died 
when the war of the rebellion broke out in 1861. The Peo- 
ple's college, at Havana, N. Y. , intended entirely for the in- 
dustrial classes, was at first offered the national agricultural 
land grant of New York State, but failing to comply with the 
conditions imposed by the legislature, this fund was passed to 
Cornell University, at Ithaca. These institutions, all estab- 
lished prior to the year 1862, when congress passed and the 
president approved the great educational land grant law, had 
come into existence, in compliance with the demands of 
modern civilization, and not at the instance of the church 



The State and HigJiei' Education. 1 1, 

colleges, but often in the face of obstacles and discourage- 
ments thrown in their way by the church schools. But Pres- 
ident John says that the "facilities of higher education exis- 
ted in this country, and met all demands, before State col- 
leges were thought of." With the single exception of Yale 
college and Hamline University at Red Wing, which estab- 
lished a so-called "Scientific department," the former in 1846, 
and the latter in 1857, not one of the church colleges, so far 
as I have been able to learn, showed the first symptom of 
knowing, much less recognizing, the difference in educational 
need between the age of Bacon and that of Lincoln. 

The soil, therefore, was all ready for the seed. The bill 
introduced by Mr. Morrill of Vermont was vetoed by con- 
servative Buchanan. Passed again at the instance of Mr. 
Wade, with only seven opposing votes, it was signed by 
President Lincoln on the 2d day of July, 1862. It has been 
said that times of war witness the birth of great ideas and the 
initiation of great enterprises. It is true that in the United 
States, with the establishment, through rivers of blood, of 
the national idea, was also established the idea of higher edu- 
cation by the State as one of the justifiable means, in a Re- 
public, of self-defense and self-perpetuation. I 

3. This is all passed now, nearly two decades ago. If we 
proceed to inquire what has been its effect, we shall be able 
to answer another of President John's surprising statements. 
Is the design of the law establishing these industrial colleges 
by congress, "a conspicuous and universally acknowledged 
failure?" 

One of the first effects of this land grant by congress was 
an awakening in the church colleges, then existing, to the 
value of the public domain as an educational agency. This 
was so rapid, and so great, that some of them succeeded in 
capturing the whole fund almost before the people knew it 
had been given to them. In others, along with a compliance 
with the terms of the act, the State demanded a representa- 



t2 The State and Higher Education. 

tion on the controlling board; but in most cases the church 
colleges were passed by, and new institutions were founded 
by the various States, though still in many cases cornbined 
with some other State or private fund. 

In the second place, this law, which has so positively been 
pronounced a failure, brought into existence, up to 1876, 
about forty schools of agriculture and mechanic arts, often 
styled national schools of science. These have come into ex- 
istence since 1862 — except in three States where similar insti- 
tutions had already been endowed by State funds. In some 
cases also the fund was applied by the State legislatures to re- 
juvenate weakly scientific institutions, or to further endow 
those that were flourishing. In the meantime, since 1862, 
the various churches of the United States had founded, up to 
1876, 106 denominational schools. Some of these are based 
on broad foundations, and, like Hamline University, offer 
the student the most complete scientific as well as classical 
and literary culture. While the national schools of science 
are mainly confined to their own sphere — the primary intent 
of the law creating them — the new church schools cover all 
fields of knowledge. It cannot certainly be unjust to them 
to compare their patronage by the youth of the country, with 
that received by the State schools. This, perhaps, will throw 
some light on the question of their asserted failure. 

The 106 denominational colleges, established between 1862 
and 1876, both inclusive, as reported by the Commissioner of 
Education, are found to be giving instruction to 13,757 stu- 
dents, including all departments, preparatory and undergrad- 
uate, in all branches of knowledge, from theology to chemis- 
try and engineering, giving them an average of 130 students 
for each institution. Of these students, 9,066 are reported as 
in the preparatory (or secondary) grade of study, an average 
of 85 for each institution; and 4,691 are reported in under- 
graduate studies — an average of 44 for each institution. 

Taking the same authority for the statistics of the forty 



The State and Higher Education. 13 

State schools of agriculture and mechanic arts, and including 
only those students that are strictly in those departments, 
wherever a pre-existing college received the congressional 
grant, we find 4,891 students; which gives an average of 122 
for each institution. Of these 631 are reported in prepara- 
tory (or secondary) courses, and 4,260 in the undergraduate 
courses of study. This gives Jhe State schools an average of 
16 in the preparatory classes and 106 in the higher classes. 
Thus it can be seen that, as institutions of higher learning, 
the attendance on the new church colleges is but 41 per cent 
of that on the State colleges. Hence, if the law of congress 
which called into existence these State colleges be a failure, 
how much greater the failure of that sectarian spirit which 
called these 106 denominational colleges into existence. 
Another remarkable effect of this movement toward popu- 
larizing higher education in America was the renovation and 
elevation of the church colleges, then existing, and the estab- 
lishment of numerous others with much broader and a more 
liberal scope of instruction. This of itself has resulted in im- 
mense benefit to education, as well as to the church, in 
America. This effect is as important as the creation of the 
State schools themselves. The church has always been the 
principal agent of higher education, at least in the United 
States, and the recognition, by these institutions, of the 
great underlying truths of nature, and of the ministration of 
her laws to the daily comfort of man, is an epoch in the his- 
tory of the nineteenth century, which, in its effects on the 
race, will exceed all other achievements of the "new educa- 
tion." It will contribute not only to the spread of science, 
but also to the spread of Christianity, particularly among 
those intelligent classes of the people who have been hostile 
to it, or indifferent, because of the attitude of the Christian 
church toward the truths of modern science. If the church 
once recognizes the fact that every enlightened nation is in 
arms against its supine adherence to medieval education, and 



14 The State and HigJicr Education. 

condescends to place itself in harmony with the truths of cre- 
ation as well as revelation, one of the greatest obstacles to 
the evangelization of the world will be removed. It is easy to 
see that the material aspects of modern civilization are rapidl)- 
penetrating unchristian and uncivilized nations, outstripping 
the church in evangelizing them. How much better it 
would be if the two agencies could go harmoniously together 
into the same field, co operating to accomplish the same end. 
(4). What has been said, so far, relates to the past. A few 
matters of fact have been stated. They pertain to the title, 
by which the State received, and holds, the educational 
structure which she has occupied. But President John not 
only disputes the title, but also the right of the State to occu- 
py this field. We admit that force does not always coincide 
with right, and that, although nine points in the law are es- 
tablished when a peaceful possession is proven, the tenth 
point may have the right on its side. Let us inquire, then, 
if there be a consistent reasonableness in the State's attempt- 
ing and continuing to do this work. We shall not attempt 
here the justification of the State in establishing and main- 
taining primary and secondary schools. It is not demanded. 
In passing, however, we will accept President John's defini- 
tion of the duty of the State to educate. He fixes it at the 
"limit of necessity to preserve its own existence." So let it 
be. We shall recur to it again. But, specifically, as relates 
to higher education, the leading objections that have been 
urged are the following: (i) The personality of the State. 
President Elliot has fully presented this objection. It is for- 
eign to the free spirit of American republicanism to witness 
the controlling influence and authority of the State in social 
and educational affairs. It smacks of the divine right of 
kings, and is a reminder of the despotism of Europe, two 
centuries ago. Now all this may be an objection in monarch- 
ical governments, but it seems rather strange that any prom- 
inent educator in republican America should forget that here 



The State and Higher Education. 15 

the people are the State. There is no kingly personality in- 
terfering with the domestic and social institutions of the commu- 
nity. The authority that controls is the aggregate will of the 
community. The chief right of the State's power is to con- 
serve this aggregate will. Such an expression of the will of 
the people ib voluntaryism in the discharge of its highest 
organic function, and is not "paternal government." (2) 
Again it is objected to State education, that it tends to uni- 
formity, and not to variety, reducing all pupils to the same 
patern, and smothering the aspirations of genius which spurns 
conventionalities and revels in the gratification of its own 
idiosyncrasies. This objection is more valid in the lower 
schools than in the higher. In the higher schools it is very 
questionable if the institutions of the church would be as leni- 
ent with idiosyncrasies in pupils, as those of the State. 
Judging from the past it would be folly for a student with an 
idiosyncrasy of genius to flee to a church college for its indul- 
gence. We cannot see how this objection applies more fully 
to State colleges'than to church colleges. In fact it is one of 
the necessary sacrifices which an individual has to make, 
when he becomes one of an organized community. He re- 
ceives the benefits of combined effort in all directions, and he 
has to surrender the personal freedom to act in certain direc- 
tions in which his action would transgress the aggregate good 
of the community. The schools are for the average pupil — 
both State schools and church schools— and he with an idio- 
syncrasy will look in vain for a place to disport himself. 
(3). It is urged again that it is not economical. Because, 
forsooth, a sectarian zeal demands denominational colleges, 
and "cannot conscientiously accept this service of the State," 
and will maintain colleges of its own, therefore the State can- 
not rightfully duplicate these institutions and tax the denomi- 
nations for their maintenance. Not to mention the brevity 
of the time elapsed since the sects were willing to "do the 
same kind of work" as the State University, it is enough to 



1 6 The State and Higher Ed7teatioji. 

reply that this argument appHes against all State organiza- 
tion for education. The Roman Catholic insists on main- 
taining his own hospitals, and objects to taxation for the 
public schools. The Atheist opposes the public tax because 
in these schools is taught the idea of a God, the Jew be- 
cause the New Testament is read, or the Protestant because 
it is not. This argument against the public schools may be 
applied with equal reason against the State's management of 
the deaf and mute. At least, certain medical fraternities 
might use it because they cannot "conscientiously" endorse 
nor accept the methods of treatment practised by the State. 
(4). But the fourth objection, after all, is the chief one urged 
by the opponents of State schools — they do not correctly in- 
doctrinate the student in matters of religious dogma. It is 
said that "the State by self-imitation cannot teach religion." 
This assertion the State accepts, and would fain leave it to 
the proper agent, yet the State is not therefore "prohibited 
by statutory limitation from throwing the least safeguard 
around the minds of our youth, "which is one of the surpris- 
ing inferences of President John. The State in its education- 
al operations will always be governed by the aggregate senti- 
ment of the people. Those fundamental ideas of religion, 
which are aceepted by all sects, the State institutions will be 
compelled to teach. If, peradventure, for a time they happen 
to lapse from this high duty, the will of the community wili 
sooner or later be restored. They are creatures of the peo- 
ple. They will teach what the people can agree on shall be 
taught. While they must not teach sectarian dogma, they 
must not become centers of atheisn nor of infidelity. If they 
did either, they would not long survive. Like the schools of 
Switzerland, they are based on the "principles of Christiani- 
ty and democracy." The special, political and denomina- 
tional application of these broad platforms is left to party 
politics, and to the various sects. 

We venture the assertion, however, that when the true 



The State and Higher Editcation. ij 

kernel of this objection is found, it will not consist in a fear of 
the non-inculation of these truths by the state, but in a jeal- 
ousy of the sects, one against the other. Education by the 
church has been considered essentially the training" of the 
youth and the doctrines of the catechism. Though greatly 
extended in scope, it is still animated by the same cardinal 
principle. Each sect must defend itself by teaching its own 
dogmas to the youth, and, though every state college were to 
be abolished, there would be still as great a reason for main- 
taining all the denominational colleges. How long it would 
be before they would degenerate to the condition of mere 
sectarian propaganda, as before the revival, no one can say, 
but there would be a strong tendency in that direction. Freed 
from the competition of stote colleges, their zeal in the teach- 
ing of science would soon' lag. Not having ready access to the 
public means and resources of instruction, such as the state 
archives, maps, authorities, explorations, surveys, statistics, 
and to the avenues by which the state knows and readily reg- 
ulates the great industries of the people, the church colleges 
would very soon see that there is an actual incongruity in 
their assuming to direct the. scientific and industrial education 
of the people. It is the chief business of the church to look 
after the spiritual well-being of the people and not to fit them 
to carry forward the complicated machinery of modern civi- 
lization. Religion is the lubricator of this vast system, and 
the cnurch is the agent by which it is applied. When the 
church departs from this sphere, she forsakes the true idea of 
the primitive church. When she leaves her spiritual kingdom 
and assumes to direct in the construction of steam engines, in 
the handling of theodolites and compasses, in the manage-^ 
ment of cotton-gins, in the measurement of the angles of 
crystals, and the distances to the stars, she may very reason- 
ably beheld to be out of her sphere. She has the privilege, 
of course, of doing all these things, and there was a time when 
she had good reason to do them, and was urged to do them. 



1 8 TJic State and HigJicr Education. 

as the only capable agent; but that tiriie has passed, and it can 
hardly be considered to be her duty to do them in the nine- 
teenth century, when other agents equally capable have arisen, 
endowed with that special duty and function. 

One of the boasted advanced steps of the nineteenth cen- 
tury is the separation of the church and state. In the mere 
manipulation of the governmental machine this is fully real- 
ized in the United States, and in much of continental Europe. 
But the administration of the laws is not the state, nor, indeed, 
is the making of the laws, nor both of these united. True 
statesmanship surveys the whole body politic. It foresees 
and often institutes national enterprises. It watches the ex- 
ternal and also the internal influences that move the masses; 
it takes advantage of the shifting markets for the domestic 
products. It notes the rise and decline of the various indus- 
tries. It applies stimulants when needed and repression when 
necessary. In short, the state is an all-prevading, energizing, 
regulating, far-seeing organization of the people; the culmina- 
ting expression of the modern democracy. It is this ma- 
chinery, which in our day is very closely connected with the 
appliances of modern science, which is not free from the 
church, but which the church assumes still to direct. Instead, 
we claim that it is the right and duty of the state itself to 
look after its own interests, and especially its highest interests, 
and to take measures to qualify citizens not only to read their 
ballots, but to discharge all the duties of high citizenship. 
There is no limit to this duty short of the necessity of the 
state, as has already been admitted. That which constitutes 
a state — "high-minded men" — is its necessity, and that it is 
the duty of the state to provide, to the end that its multifar- 
ious industry may be under the guide of the highest states- 
manship. 



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